Virgin Hacks Puppy

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Lobster
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Virgin Hacks Puppy

#1 Post by Lobster »

from another thread . . .
This seems to be some sort of intrusion attempt, or a new stateful packet inspection by the internet provider ?


Apart from their space program
and other activities (including media interests)
Virgin are my ISP (they are fast) despite the fact that they are known to have a policy of blocking or redirecting internet traffic - in other words interfering with your internet access.
http://www.maximumpc.com/article/news/v ... le_sharers

How does their latest hack work?
Well . . . sometimes I will type in a high volume bandwidth link into Seamonkey
and what comes up is the Virgin search engine
http://advancedsearch.virginmedia.com/s ... rl=youtube

Seems like they are providing a service?
http://www.virginmedia.com/myvirginmedia/advancederror/

Am I under bot surveillance from my ISP?
No doubt.

Will I change. Dunno probably not. Have thought about it previously. Should I be more pro active? :roll:
Last edited by Lobster on Thu 15 Oct 2009, 11:14, edited 1 time in total.
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DaveS
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#2 Post by DaveS »

Surely you have chosen an ISP with a vested interest in crushing file sharing? How come?
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#3 Post by Lobster »

:? Ignorance :oops:

We signed up with Virgin because they were faster and cheaper than Zen (previous broadband)
Then . . . they announced their file sharing stance (after we signed for a year)
Believe it or not it was quite a procedure moving to Virgin
I explained the issues to my sister who also uses the service
(and gets some mobile phone deal too) and advised moving but left the decision to her.

She decided we would stay :?
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davesurrey
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#4 Post by davesurrey »

Hi Lobster,
I noticed you said you'd been with Zen previously. I've been with those guys for around 6 years and find them absolutely excellent.

Other friends have had poor experiences with quality of service (in all aspects) with Virgin and other ISPs and I've usually suggested changing to Zen or an Entanet supplier eg adsl24. They are cheaper than Zen and have similar high quality custom care and stable services plus don't lock you in for a 12 mionth contract.

To me broadband access is so important that I prefer paying a little extra for much better and reliable service. And living out in the sticks I can't take advantage of the fastest connection rates anyway. :-(

But as they say...each to his own.

Dave

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#5 Post by Lobster »

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/s ... 875326.ece

Agreed.
I am within two miles of an exchange (allowing high speed internet)
I find Virgin is faster (my programming friend Shadow was using my Virgin connected machine and noted it was faster than his Zen connection.)
However I feel he will stick with Zen - they are after all sufficient for him and his daughter.

Media providers (like Virgin) want to control search engine results (meaning they can get paid by favoured corporate sponsors)

My experience is the beginning of the wedge
I have seen similar wedges with Gmail
but I use still use gmail.

I want London wide broadband - time to twitter my MP . . . 8)
Last edited by Lobster on Thu 19 Nov 2009, 06:42, edited 1 time in total.
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#6 Post by davesurrey »

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/s ... 875326.ece
Yes I saw that earlier today.
I was lucky enough to do my Physics at the Cavendish but it now seems I've got to add a few more terms to Maxwell's equations.
Did you do Physics?

And not sure how so many of the new discoveries around absolute zero, that folk say can be made practical, square up with the imminence of Global warming.

I think Dyson's new blade-less fan is more immediately accessible despite it's £200 price tag.

Dave

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#7 Post by Lobster »

Even though we seem to have moved on to vacuum cleaners :oops:
I feel the issues of ISP intrusion is a major point of breach.
As is using a recording search engine such as Giggle . . . Gagall . . .
Google (how could anyone forget)

In the UK we have a data protection act
but with no desire to enforce personal privacy

Perhaps we are moving towards transparency
and degrees of openness that some wish to close off from?

I like knowing where my MP is buying her latest duck house from
Maybe compulsory tagging of politicians with life cams?
Or here is something we can use on the curs
http://l.pr/a47nc/

and now back to the vacuuming . . .
:)
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benali72
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No intenet privacy in the USA

#8 Post by benali72 »

Here in the USA, most users are in the position I'm in -- you only have the choice of a couple major ISP's (like a major DSL carrier versus Comcast cable).

I use AT&T DSL (as do many millions).

AT&T changed their Terms of Service back in 2007 to say that they own all your internet data. You are on notice that they can track and store a record of everything you do online.

Why would they make this change? Probably for the same reason Congress passed FISA-II in 2008 with its provision to protect the telecomms from lawsuits over internet tracking. Undoubtedly AT&T was cooperating with the Bush administration's effort to scan all USA internet traffic.

(Verification -- much has come out on this topic at Wired- Threat Level, ARS Technica, msnbc Red Tape Chronicles, NY Times (James Risen), and elsewhere.)

Bottom line, in the USA most serious observers understand that NSA scans all domestic internet traffic without a warrant, in direct contradiction to US law.

And now we fight the battle of "net neutrality," meaning if we lose corporations will have authority over the content we can view on the internet.

This chart at Privacy International says it all http://www.privacyinternational.org/art ... 347-559597.

The US and the UK have undergone a profound shift in the power relationship between individual and state. As the chart shows, both now rank right up there with China and Russia in this regard.

IMHO, the one big difference between the US and UK is that in the UK surveillance is part of the Labour platform and is understood to be its public policy. In the US surveillance has occurred illegally and without public disclosure.

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Re: No intenet privacy in the USA

#9 Post by Sit Heel Speak »

benali72 wrote:Here in the USA,...
Well said, and quite accurate.

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